Dark Secrets (65 page)

“
I know, my love, but
this is life,” David said. “And our reality is that fiction doesn’t
mix with fact.”

“
Yet I’m sitting
beside a vampire right now,” I said sarcastically.

“
The only thing
fictional about vampires is the possibility of one falling for a
human.”

I smiled to
myself.

He stole my hand back
and sat quietly then, tracing his fingertip down the middle of my
palm again.

“
It really bothers
you, doesn’t it?” I asked.

“
What?”

“
The lines—the
changes.”

“
It’s symbolic of
many things, I believe.”

“
Like
what?”

“
Perhaps not just the
future, but maybe…”

“
Maybe?”

“
Nothing.” He laughed
and folded my fingers around his, but the smile faded from his eyes
and a flicker of something foreign flashed for only a second before
it disappeared. “I’m just being melodramatic.”

“
David.” I squeezed
his hand a little tighter. “Is something wrong?”

“
I—No.” He patted my
hand and released it, smiling. “It’s nothing. Let’s just enjoy this
day.”

“
Okay, but, you’d
tell me, right? If there was something wrong?”

“
Probably
not.”

I cleared my throat,
unbuckling my seatbelt, but as I turned to open the door, looked up
at the vampire standing there.

He offered his hand.
“Would you like to go back to the island today?”

“
Yeah.” I took his
hand. “Sounds great.”

Raindrops broke the
glassy stillness of the water, distorting the deep red reflection
of autumn foliage. Ripple upon ripple stretched closer to the
shore, pushing the clusters of orange and brown leaves in laps up
onto the clay banks. David and I stood at the cusp of the lake,
hand in hand, watching the watery road out to the
island.

“
It’s magnificent
this time of year, isn’t it?”

“
It’s always
magnificent,” I said. “But I wish I’d worn a skirt instead of
jeans.”

“
Hm,” he hummed,
giving an automated smile.

I stood between him
and his distracted glare. “David?”

“
Hm?” He managed to
look at me this time.

“
I know there’s
something wrong. What is it?”

“
Nothing.”

“
That’s not
nothing.”

“
Well, it’s nothing
that needs discussing right now.”

Above us, the dark
grey clouds closed in, swallowing the last smudge of blue left in
the sky, making the sudden dread in my gut go deeper. “So?” I
closed my eyes for a second, pushing the swell of worry aside. “Are
we going to the island, or are we gonna stand here and get
incredibly wet?”

He looked up at the
sky. “Perhaps we should go home. I’m not sure even the island can
contain that storm.”

I hugged myself,
shivering a little as dots of rain fell over my bare
shoulders.

“
You cold?” David
asked, rubbing my arm.

I nodded. “I can feel
the autumn coming on.”

“
And so follows the
winter,” he said absently, his shoulders dropping. “Come on
then.”

My hand linked with
his. “Home?”

“
No. The island.
Never know when it might be our last chance to go back
there.”

“
I’ll always go back
there—even when you’re not with me anymore.”

His nose and chin
stayed pointed at the island, while his eyes slowly drifted onto
me, narrowing, the question on his mind a breath away from his
lips. But I squealed, my arms flailing out in an octopus manner
when he bent down and scooped me up.

“
What are you
doing?”

“
Getting us to the
island faster.”

“
Oh. Crap!” I buried
my face in his neck, my teeth making a cage as the forces of
gravity tried to hold me down under the vampire’s need for speed.
It felt kind of like going upside down on a roller coaster, gravity
pushing at my head, compressing my arms and legs, possibly trying
to cube me.

We stopped abruptly
and my gut kept going as my feet touched the ground. I folded over,
feeling heat rush into my cheeks and ears.

“
You gonna be sick?”
David laughed.

“
I’m okay.” I reached
up and grabbed his arm, using it to steady myself. “I’m
okay.”

“
Just take slow
breaths. It’ll ease off.”

I nodded, rolling to a
stand under the majesty of our secret little island. Even if I was
about to puke, the cool cave of foliage stole my thoughts enough to
make me forget how fast I’d just travelled, and the fruity tingle
of wild flowers filled my senses, making it easier to
breathe.

“
Better now?” David
asked.

“
Yeah.
Better.”

“
Good.”

In my peripheral, a
vibrant purple petal caught my eye; I turned to David and
smiled.

“
For you,” he said,
tucking my hair back with the flower.

“
You know, I still
have the one you gave me here last time.”

“
I know,” he said,
sliding his hand down my arm to take my hand. “Ara?”

“
Mm?” I tore my eyes
away from the canopy—the way the gaps in the leaves, if I looked
only at the grey behind them, looked like blurry, floating
lanterns.

“
I need to tell you
something.” As our eyes met, a flash of sadness turned his pale
green. “Something which, I’m afraid to say, is not good
news.”

“
Okay.” My small
voice trembled.

“
I told you I’d warn
you when it was time for me to leave?”

My stomach sunk; I bit
my bottom lip.

“
Well…the—” his voice
steadied with a chest-lifting breath, his gaze fixing on my lips,
rising up to my eyes. “The time has come.”

“
No.”

“
I’ve been called to
return to duty.”

“
What?
When?”

“
Two
weeks.”

“
Two weeks? But,
that’s not enough time. How can I—how can you expect me to...” I
fought several arguments with him in my head, not winning any of
them. “No, you can’t do this. You have to tell them no.”

“
That’s not the worst
part, Ara.” He took another deep breath. “In that two weeks, I am
expected to operate the Set from the New York offices. I will only
be able to see you at night.”

“
Night? Two weeks?
And that’s it? For forever?”

“
Unless you change
your mind and become a vampire,” he said in a low, dry
tone.

“
David. I can’t make
a decision like that in two weeks. How can you possibly expect me
to—”

“
Because you have to,
Ara!” He looked at me long enough to see the hurt infect my face.
“The time is now. Like it or not. You have to choose. When the full
moon rises in a fortnight, I will be boarding a train and leaving
for Le Château de la Mort—with or without you beside
me.”

“
You can’t do this to
me. Mike’s here for the next two weeks. How am I going to choose
between life and immortality while he’s distracting me?” I wiped
fat raindrops off my shoulder, moving out from under the giant leaf
collecting them. “Can’t you reason with them? Can’t you do
something?”

“
Ara. You don’t understand the ways of the Set. I’ve been
ordered to return by the head of the World Council—the
king,
for God’s sake.
One does not refuse an order from the king.”

“
But—”

“
Look.” He dropped
his head with a dejected breath. “Two weeks to get my affairs in
order was a generous courtesy. He needn’t have offered that at
all.”

“
Why? Are you in
trouble?”

“
In ways.” He looked
up at the leaf above us and grabbed my hand, leading me to the
shelter of a larger tree. “The man I entrusted to run things in my
absence has proven less than reliable. I must return and pull
things into line.”

“
But you have a life
here. What about school and—”

“
The Set do not care! It’s a part of being on the Council. I
knew this when I joined; I accepted that with all of its glory and
all of its responsibility. I
must
leave. That is all there is to
it.”

The pattering of rain
filled the silence in around us while it all sunk in. “But, what
will I do without you—how will I get through the days?”

“
Something tells me
you’ll be fine.” He smiled conceitedly, shaking his head
once.

“
What’s
that
supposed to mean?”

“
Nothing.”

“
David?” I demanded,
stepping closer.

He stared at the
ground. “I was listening last night. When you spoke to Emily and
Alana—about Mike.”

Oh
no
. My lips parted for some kind of
explanation, but only air came out.

“
That’s what
happened? Wasn’t it?” He looked back at me. “The reason you were
crying the night you asked your mom to pick you up? The night
she—”

“
Yes,” I
whispered.

“
I’m so sorry, Ara.”
He gripped the back of my head and pulled me into him, squishing my
cheek against his warm, soggy cotton shirt. “He was a fool to turn
you down.”

“
No, he was probably
smart.”

David leaned back a
little and cupped my face delicately in his hands. “I guess that
explains your over-analysing when
I
wouldn’t kiss you. I’m sorry. If I had
known—”

“
It’s not your fault.
You did the right thing. Better to feel undesirable for a few days
than to be dead, right?” I laughed a short release of
tension.

“
Do you love
him?”

“
Who?”

“
Mike.”

“
I—” My eyes drifted
past David’s to nothing in particular.

“
S’il te plait, mon
amour, tell me the truth. It will hurt more if you lie.”

“
I...” New tears came
for a new kind of pain: betrayal, unrequited love, the loss of a
friend. I hadn't cried for Mike yet, and I needed to so
badly.

I closed my eyes, and
a tight cramp twisted my heart. If Mike had loved me that night, I
wouldn’t be here. But he didn’t, and now I had David—only to lose
him, too.

“
I love you more than
I love him.”

David stiffened,
straightening away from me. “But he’s better for you. You can live
with him—die with him.”

“
But he doesn’t love
me, David.”

“
You lied to me,” he
said coldly.

“
I know.” My eyes
closed involuntarily. “I’m sorry. I know I told you once that I
don’t love him. It’s just that—I’m really confused.” I looked at
him; he looked away. “When Mike rejected me, I locked all the
feelings I have for him deep inside. I felt so damn stupid. I
didn't even want to admit them to myself.” I touched a hand to my
chest, my words a breathless whisper. “I was just trying to forget
it happened.” I searched for compassion in David’s eyes, but only a
hard man glared down at me, his jaw stiff. Everything around me
felt cold; the air, my arms, my face, even my heart.

“
Perhaps, with this
information coming to light, we no longer need our last two weeks
together.”

“
David. No,” I said,
grabbing his arm, but my words disappeared under a roll of thunder.
“It doesn’t have to be this way. We—we can work it out—”

“
There’s nothing to
work out. You love Mike, and you don’t want
immortality.”

“
I never said that.
Please, we can make our own future. I believe in magic still. I
believe there’s hope for us—for our lives, tog—”

“
Shh.” He placed a finger over my lips and brought his face
down to align our eyes. “No, Ara, my love. It is all too clear to
me now. I have to be the strong one, for both of us—” he dropped
his finger, “—and you have to be the one that goes on. You
must
go on, have babies,
beautiful babies, and be happy—live that dream.”

“
Don’t you get it,
David?” I shook my head, my eyes still, watering. “You’re the only
dream I want to live.”

“
Precisely.
Live
. You’ve been waiting for me to tell you I’ll stay, that all
of this is some nightmare. But, my love—” His eyes softened, a
hundred years of sadness flaming within them. “It’s
not.”

I managed one syllable
before the smoke of his words stung my eyes, forcing the volcanic
eruption of blubbering.

“
Don't cry,
sweetheart. I love you, and you will always belong to me. But I
can’t keep lying to myself, believing you’ll change your
mind.”